Between Voice and Discourse: Quilting Interviews on Anorexia

Abstract

This article asks, "How can we be true to and respect the inner experiences of people and at the same time critically assess the cultural discourses that form the very stuff from which our experiences are made?" To answer this question, the article proposes a quilting mode of doing and writing research that aims to be sensitive to the texture and nuance of personal stories or patches and, by stitching them together, points to discursive resonances between them. The quilting approach is used to make sense of interviews conducted with five anorexic women, listening closely to the voices of these women who are often silenced as disordered, and to illustrate how they complicate and are complicated by notions of anorexics as being too dependent and/or too good.

Alcohol abuse in cancer patients: a shadow side in the oncological field and research

“…This is the case even if more disturbing elements were included from the perspective of differently positioned persons who bring into question the taken-for-granted and could lead to a perception of a reality that had been hidden. It is not the case that a new narrative replaces the former one, but that the gap and the divergences between 22 these narratives provide new material for reflection (Saukko, 2000;McLean and Leibing, 2007).…”

“…The complexity of the empirical material in this study can be seen as a possible way of understanding the mainly tacit existence of alcohol abuse of a cancer patient from multiple perspectives and different positions in the social context within which the alcohol abuser lives (Bourdieu, 1999). The perspective of differently positioned persons, which means using other persons' narratives to understand the life of a person, brings into question the taken-for-granted and eventually leads to a perception of a reality that had been in the shadow (Saukko, 2000). In this way, a life history is a social construction, created by the narrator, his social relations and the researchers (Järvinen, 2000).…”

Eating Like an Ox: Femininity and Dualistic Constructions of Bulimia and Anorexia

“…Eckermann, 1997;Hepworth, 1999;Malson, 1998;McKinnley, 1999;Saukko, 2000;Squire, 2003). This body of work has revealed the dualistic hierarchical organization of autobiographical descriptions of selfstarving and binge/purging and of representations of women who engage in these practices.…”

The quantification of gender: Anorexia nervosa and femininity

“…Orbach's (1978; broader critique has proven to be highly influential but more theoretically sophisticated critiques have developed that took some elements of Orbach's analysis and often combined it with a Foucauldian approach. The notion of the anorexic being unable, or unwilling, to resist the influence of certain damaging aspects of culture has nevertheless remained at the centre of feminist accounts and debates (Blood, 2005;Bordo, 2001;Gremillion, 1992;2003;Guilfoyle, 2009;Lester, 1997;Malson, 2009;Saukko, 2000;. There is not space in this article to fully explore this literature 3 , but, what is important to take from these accounts for the purposes of this paper is the way in which they took Bruch's position and subverted it.…”